I've used a batch file and prepending "start", "start /b", and "cmd" to my command both in combination and separately.

Almost all of the things I tried will start the process but it will never show a window for me to interact with the launched program. The only think I can do is kill the process in Task Manager.

From all the reading I did by searching Google, it seems like people have gotten this to work, but it doesn't seem to be working for me, even with simple commands like "notepad.exe".

The only difference, from what i can tell, is I'm running a xampp installation and they're not (some were using IIS, others were unclear).

Can someone help me verify where the problem is? I don't know if the problem is with the Apache configuration, PHP configuration, my computer's configuration, something else, or none of the above (maybe it only works with IIS?).

Thanks for reading this far, and I appreciate any helpful insight or direction.